What the Capture of Beersheva in 1917 Taught Me about Isaac﻿

I am ashamed to say it, but when I was a kid I thought Isaac, the Jewish patriarch, was a wuss: a good son, a spitting image of his father, a willing volunteer to be sacrificed to God, a learned man, and a farmer. But he didn’t travel the world like his father Abraham – from Babylon to southern Turkey, to Canaan, Egypt, Philistine, and back to Canaan. He wasn’t a warrior like Abraham who commanded 300 fighters on a forced march from the Dead Sea to Damascus to battle kings. Isaac paled in comparison to his son Jacob who raised 12 sons and a daughter, prepared defensive formations to meet a threatening Esau, and traveled to Egypt. Jacob was the founder of the people of Israel, his namesake.

While the lives, travels, and travails of Abraham, Jacob, and Joseph are spread across much of the book of Genesis, the story of Isaac barely fills this week’s Torah Parsha, Toldot. What was remarkable about his story in the Bible? Well, the Torah relates, he dug wells, he opened wells that had been sealed by the Philistines, and he gave names to the wells.

Rabbinic literature compares flowing water to the Torah – essential for life – and the rabbis credit Isaac for the nurturing Torah he provided. Three of his wells were given names related to the first and second Temples, according to tradition, and the third name signified the third, future Temple. And wells always played an important role for the romances of the Torah – by a well Abraham’s servant found Rivka, Isaac’s eventual wife. Hagar, Abraham’s second wife, found refuge at a well where later Isaac first met Rivka. And Moses met his wife Zipporah by a well.

Still, why did the Torah provide a long narrative about Isaac and his interaction with the Philistines over the wells? Commentaries point out that both Abraham and Isaac had testy experiences with the Philistines of Gaza, but the tribe recognized and respected the power and stature of Abraham. But after he left the scene, the Philistine filled in the wells, challenging Isaac to do something about it.

Why? Because wells provided the sustenance to grow crops, water herds, and build communities. They allowed nomadic tribes to set down roots. And after the roots were set, the waters enabled communities to grow in numbers and space. It was what both Abraham and Isaac were promised and what they strove for. It was what the Philistines sought to block.

Opening the Wells 3000 Years Later

After the Turks and Germans failed to dislodge the British forces along the Suez Canal in 1915, the British decided to take the battle to them in the Sinai and Palestine. The major Turkish base for the southern campaign was in Beersheva, with its wells and railhead. The major impediment for the British crossing the Sinai and into the Negev was the lack of water.

A New Zealand officer of the Mounted Rifles described how they overcame the challenge: “The water was brought through two pipe lines which were laid side by side over the desert and eventually took the Nile into Palestine, by a system of pumps and reservoirs in approximately 20 mile stages.”

The process was slow and vulnerable.

Enter Aaron Aaronsohn, the Jewish agronomist famous for establishing the Jewish spy network NILI to help the British. As described by Douglas Feith in Mosaic Magazine last year, Aaronsohn presented to the British a “theory that water flowed in abundance under the deserts of Sinai and southern Palestine. He mocked the assumption of British officers that they needed to build a railroad and pipeline to bring water from Egypt.” Aaronsohn cited ancient writings about gardens in the desert, and insisted that water could be found beneath the ground. “Rock formations supported his theory,” Feith wrote.

Australian soldiers repair Beersheva well, November 1917.

A British Intelligence officer related this story, Feith wrote: “Aaronson bullied the officer commanding the Royal Engineers into sending to Egypt for boring machinery, undertaking that water would be found at a depth of 300 feet. When an experimental shaft was sunk, water gushed up from a depth of 295 feet.”

Wells and sources of water supported the British campaign to capture Beersheva and all of Palestine, and Aaronsohn’s knowledge of the wells was essential. He was following in his forefather Isaac’s footsteps.

The New Zealand military diarist described the water search around Beersheva: “To enable the attack upon Beersheva to be so made, preparatory measures had to be undertaken some days before, to provide water for those troops taking part in the encircling movement and also to advance the front line. The water required was to be sufficient” for several divisions, he wrote. “The bulk of the work of finding and developing the water supply fell on two brigades” and ANZAC field squadrons who “performed wonders….The work at Khalasa and Asluj consisted of clearing out the deep wells that the Turks had blown in.”

The desert wells provided water for the men and horses, some of which had gone 35 hours without drinking. The joint Australian-New Zealand-British force was able to capture Beersheva and its wells. As the troops stormed into the desert oasis, the Turks and Germans destroyed some of the wells, which Australian engineers repaired.

With their animals watered and their canteens filled from the Beersheva wells, General Allenby’s troops followed God’s commandment to Jacob: “Thou shalt spread to the west, and to the east, and to the north, and to the south.” Beersheva was the point from which Allenby’s troops went north to Jerusalem and west to Gaza and Jaffa. One year later, they were in Damascus.

The Philistines had filled in the wells, attempting to sabotage the expansion of Abraham’s universal message. The Turks blew up the wells seeking to stop the British Forces’ eventual liberation of Jerusalem and a repressed land. How ironic and tragic that today Hamas rockets from Gaza attempt to destroy the Ashkelon desalinization plant that could also provide sustenance to that parched land. Elsewhere in the Middle East – and the world – the patriarchs’ commitment to watering the world continues today thanks to Israel.

This commentary is dedicated to my grandson, Amichai Rhein, on the occasion of his bar mitzva on Shabbat Toldot.

AMERICAN INTERESTS IN THE HOLY LAND REVEALED IN EARLY PHOTOGRAPHS from 1840 to 1940

Of Life and Death

Jason Weiner never dreamed he’d be a hospital chaplain. But the nationally recognized expert on medical halachah and pastoral counseling helps Jewish patients make the most important decisions of their life.

With close to 1,000 patient beds, Cedars Sinai Hospital on Beverly Boulevard in Los Angeles is a small village. It includes multiple buildings and four parking lots. The hospitals’ interiors are modern and sleek, with spacious rooms and high-ceilinged lobbies adorned with framed modern art work. To make its affiliation clear, a white Magen David hangs atop the main building.

It takes some asking around to find Chaplain Jason Weiner’s office, which turns out to be a small, windowless space in a corridor of similar offices off the central lobby of the hospital. But Rabbi Weiner seems unperturbed as he ushers me in and moves some books off a chair. He doesn’t spend much of his time here, anyway. As the head chaplain of a large hospital, he’s more likely to be out with patients than sitting at his desk with a sefer. And when he’s not at the hospital, he’s busy serving as the rabbi of Knesset Israel Synagogue of Beverlywood and as the president of the Southern California Board of Rabbis.

Tall and spare, with a trimmed beard and glasses, Rabbi Weiner looks younger than a man just hitting 40. He is at once warm and circumspect, a person as happy to listen as to talk; he emanates a quiet, sincere empathy just right for a chaplain. Yet still waters run deep: Rabbi Weiner is a widely recognized expert on medical halachah and pastoral counseling.

Rabbi Weiner regularly fields questions about artificial hearts, assisted suicide (now legal in California), fetal surrogacy, brain death, anorexia, and more. The pressure to respond to so many previously unheard-of sh’eilos led him to pen the Jewish Guide to Practical Medical Decision Making (Urim, 2017), a copiously documented review of these issues that provides up-to-date medical information and rabbinic rulings.

Dealing with all stripes of Jews, it helps that Weiner comes from a centrist background. A native Angeleno, he grew up in a traditional home, though his parents attended a local Chabad shul. He went to public school, and since his mother was a professor in a California state university, he got a free ride to any state college. He chose an intriguing, innovative campus at Monterey Bay.

The downside was that it was a true midbar in terms of Yiddishkeit. Jason, however, took the initiative to change the situation, organizing learning and kosher food on campus. Every Erev Shabbos, he’d drive an hour to San Jose, the regional hub, to spend Shabbos with friends. “The students made me the informal ‘rabbi’ of the college,” he says. “By starting the community, I was mechazek myself.”

He was committed, if not quite a yeshivah boy. One summer he traveled with his family to New York for a family bar mitzvah, then took the train alone to Manhattan to explore. In Times Square, a group of Black Hebrews were addressing the crowds. A few of them fixed on Jason and began screaming, “You’re Jewish? You wish you were Jewish!”

They upbraided him so vehemently that Jason was traumatized. He returned to his family and spoke to his grandfather, the most Jewishly-educated, unofficial “rabbi” of the family, who reassured him that he was perfectly Jewish and the Black Hebrews were just a fringe group who knew nothing about real Judaism.

The experience sparked a need to know more about being Jewish, however. “I went to Barnes and Noble, and read a zillion books about Judaism,” he relates. One thing led to another, and he took time off to learn in Ohr Somayach in Eretz Yisrael.

After finishing his undergraduate degree, he spent six years at Ohr Somayach in Monsey (where he met his wife, Lauren) and other local yeshivos, then learned in Eretz Yisrael. He also earned a master’s degree in Jewish history at Yeshiva University. In 2006, he was offered a position in Los Angeles as the assistant rabbi of Young Israel of Century City, where Rabbi Elazar Muskin served as the head rabbi.

Rabbi Weiner was more than happy working under Rabbi Muskin. But Hashem had different plans for him. One of the shul’s distinguished mispallelim, Rabbi Levi Meier, had served as the chaplain of Cedars Sinai for 30 years. But when he found out that he had cancer, he confessed to Rabbi Muskin that he doubted he could continue his work. “Don’t worry,” Rabbi Muskin reassured him, “My assistant will fill in for you.”

Rabbi Weiner suddenly found himself dumped into a huge hospital, expected to fill the shoes of an experienced chaplain. “I thought it would be ten hours a week,” he says. “Ten was never enough. It was overwhelming.”

The responsibilities weren’t just about seeing patients. “For many unaffiliated Jews in Los Angeles, Cedars Sinai is their shul,” he explains. “People come to the hospital on Jewish holidays to pray and donate money,” he explains. “The staff of the hospital is huge — over 15,000 people — and that includes a lot of Jews. After a while I was making their weddings and bar mitzvahs.”

Over the next two years, Rabbi Meier battled his disease. When he was feeling better, he’d come in to help out, and Weiner could ask him questions. But eventually the disease claimed Rabbi Meier’s life, and the new, young chaplain was chosen to succeed him.

Along the way, he had to qualify as a chaplain by taking four semesters’ worth of CPE, or Clinical and Pastoral Education, at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles. He has also continued his education in clinical bioethics, earning a master’s degree through Loyola University and currently working on a PhD. At the beginning, he says, his staff resembled the setup for the old joke about “the priest, the minister, and the rabbi.” They were expected to serve 1,000 patients and 350 referrals a month. Rabbi Weiner did a little research and discovered that most hospitals hire one chaplain per 75 beds; at Cedars, the ratio was one chaplain per over 300 beds.

Since Cedars is a Jewish hospital, he automatically became the head of the chaplains. He put his position to good use. He hired more staff, for a total of 12 chaplains. He launched an outreach initiative to make the public aware of the chaplains’ services, and soon enough the requests for aid tripled.

The Fine Line Between Life and Death: The Hospital Rabbi

Rabbi Jason Weiner is a hospital chaplain. He guides people through intense moments in life, death, and everything in between.

When Rabbi Jason Weiner finished Rabbinical School and acquired Smicha (rabbinic ordination), the one thing he knew is that he never wanted to work in a hospital setting.

Apparently, G-d had other plans for him.

Rabbi Weiner was serving as assistant rabbi of a synagogue in Southern California when he was asked to fill in for the ill rabbi serving as hospital chaplain at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in L.A. With much hesitation, Rabbi Weiner complied. Within a few months, he realized that his work there was challenging and intriguing, as well as intensely significant.

“Synagogues oftentimes have barriers,” he explains. “There are people who don’t want to step into a synagogue. Either they’re afraid, or they don’t feel comfortable, or they can’t afford it, or they have bad memories. But there’s really no barriers to a hospital Everyone comes into the hospital. And oftentimes, people come to the hospital and they don’t have a rabbi, and they start thinking about ultimate questions, and they want guidance.”

Rabbi Jason Weiner recently authored a book called Jewish Guide to Practical Medical Decision-Making. It’s a comprehensive summary of issues that reflect both medicine and Jewish law. While it is not to be used as a replacement for conferring with rabbis or doctors, it’s an excellent resource for people who are going through medical issues, or for their families. Many doctors don’t know Jewish law and have a lot of misconceptions; many rabbis aren’t familiar enough with the medical field to give a proper answer. Rabbi Weiner shares his knowledge, and real-life stories about both situations.

He points out the difference between the medical view and the halakhic view of life and death, describes the difficult decision of giving a DNR (Do Not Resuscitate) order, talks about reproductive issues for parents who are both carriers of a deadly disease, and expounds on the wonders of stem cell research. “We believe in the value of life, in the beauty of life, and in the potential inherent in every moment of life,” Rabbi Weiner explains. “[While] we do everything to prolong life, we also don’t want to prolong the dying process or to prolong suffering.”

Do we pray for the recovery of a person on their death-bed? Can we “pull the plug” on a person who is dying in order to make room in the ICU for a trauma victim who is likely to recover? Tune in to find out, and to meet a compassionate and articulate person who has learned how to walk the fine line between spirituality and knowledge.

Compassion and Healing

Jewish medical ethics is a robust field, which quickly grows as the medical and scientific inquiry advances. While many volumes have been written on Jewish medical ethics, Jason Weiner’s Jewish Guide to Practical Medical Decision-Making is unique. Rabbi Weiner has written an excellent and important work from a perspective unlike others who have addressed this topic. While previous studies have been published by experts in Halacha, or experts in medicine, or experts in ethics. Rabbi Weiner may, in fact, be all of the these, but first and foremost he is a chaplain; he works in a hospital, and deals with patients on a daily basis. While I have studied, taught, and even given psak(halachic rulings) in many of the areas discussed in this book, my involvement is often theoretical. Reading actual cases, and learning from Rabbi Weiner’s experience, sensitivity, and wisdom, is both instructive and invaluable.

One powerful example begins on p.93: Rabbi Weiner describes his interaction with the parents of a child suffering from what turned out to be a terminal illness. These parents asked if they were permitted to pray for their son’s recovery, and Rabbi Weiner answered in the affirmative. When the illness took their son’s life, the devastated parents criticized the rabbi for allowing them to foster false hope.[1]

The human side of this interaction left a powerful impression on me. The questions of faith and prayer that it raises transcend both the medical situation and halahic question at hand. Of all the responsa and learned articles on medical ethics I have read, the interaction Rabbi Weiner describes stands out in my mind precisely because it is an authentic human interaction. It illustrates Rabbi Weiner’s experience and humanity, born of his vast experience with patients and their families.

TheJewish Guide to Practical Medical Decision-Making is equally important for professionals and lay people. The latter will find it thought-provoking and insightful on the theoretical level, or as an important resource should they be forced to confront the issues raised by modern medicine. On the other hand, rabbis – even “experts” in this field – will appreciate the topics Rabbi Weiner covers, the primary and secondary literature he cites, and the careful and extensive footnotes and citations.

Beyond these important scholarly and technical elements, The Jewish Guide to Practical Medical Decision-Making is permeated with yirat shamayim. Rabbi Weiner is not satisfied with merely cataloguing and tallying up all the rabbinic opinions on a given issue, giving equal weight to obscure and mainstream sources. This volume helps the reader navigate through the literature, balancing true scholarship with reverence for mainstream halachic process and normative Jewish practice.

To achieve this delicate balance, Rabbi Weiner has consulted with leading poskim, experts in the field. The endorsement of Rav Asher Weiss on the back of the book, stating that Rabbi Weiner “sanctifies the name of God on a daily basis” and consults with Rabbi Weiss on complicated cases, does much to refute the adage that one should not judge a book by its (back) cover.

Rabbi Weiner’s book covers a vast number of case studies, each one worthy of lengthy discussion, but I would like to address one small point regarding the issue of praying for a terminal patient.

The propriety of praying for the death of a patient is discussed by the Ra”N[2]in his commentary on a passage in gemara Nedarim.[3] In his comments, the Ra”N associates this section with the passage in Ketuvot[4] regarding the death of Rav Yehudah HaNasi. Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi’s maid seeing the agony he was enduring (presumably, she understood that her master’s condition was terminal), prayed for his death. The Ra”N concluded from this passage that it is permissible to pray for the death of a patient who is terminally ill and is suffering.

The Ra”N’s opinion is uncontested; therefore, the Oruch HaShulchan[5] considered this opinion as a precedent.

Rav Moshe Feinstein was hesitant to allow such a prayer. He argued that if the person who had been praying for the patient’s recovery is known to be a “miracle worker” (in other words, someone whose prayers are usually answered), but in this instance their prayers have not been answered, he or she may then pray for the patient’s merciful demise; Rav Moshe adds that such people do not exist in this generation. “Regular” people should not pray for another person’s death, as they are not usually able to intuit God’s will. The irony of this approach is that Rav Moshe thus catapults the anonymous maid of Rebbi, to a status which outflanks all the great sages of this generation, to a status of Rebbi Chanina Ben Dosa. According to Rav Moshe, death should not be prayed for.[6] Presumably, Rav Moshe would prefer, a “pareve” prayer for God to have mercy on the person who is suffering. God alone can decide if the merciful thing is to heal the sufferer or to hasten a compassionate death.[7]

There is, however, a comment by Rashi recorded in the Shita Mekubetzet (who cites a “first edition” of Rashi) that is germane to the discussion of appropriate prayers. The Talmudic passage in Ketuvot about the death of Rav Yehudah HaNasi (Rebbi) states that on the day he died, the rabbis declared that whoever says that Rebbi has died will be stabbed with a sword. Why would this be punishable by death? Rashi explains, that if people learn that Rebbi had died they would stop praying – his death would be a final, immutable fact. But the power of prayer is such that when we do not realize that we are praying for an impossible miracle, the miracle is still possible.[8] We operate in a logical, rational world, but the power of prayer is such that even the impossible is, in fact, possible. In much the same way, the realm of medical ethics is a world of faith which often collides with the world of bitter reality. We remain both believers and rationalists and hope that God performs miracles in the background.

I strongly recommend this work for the important discussions and sources it contains, but also for its kind, informed, compassionate voice, which is an important addition to the genre.

Rabbi Ari Kahn is Rabbi of the Mishkan Etrog community in Givat Ze’ev, he teaches in Bar Ilan University and is a member of Vaad Rabbanai Zaka.

Readers are invited to view the original post to read the footnote details

Abraham Isaac Kook (7 September 1865 – 1 September 1935) was an Orthodox rabbi, the first Ashkenazi chief rabbi of British Mandatory Palestine, the founder of Yeshiva Mercaz HaRav Kook (The Central Universal Yeshiva), a Jewish thinker, Halakhist, Kabbalist, and a renowned Torah scholar, and arguably one of the most celebrated and influential rabbis of the 20th century. Rabbi Kook’s seminal work on repentance, Oros HaTeshuvah, is recognized as a classic of Jewish thought but has, because of its difficult language and its theological depth, remained inaccessible to many. “Song of Teshuvah” presents readers with the original Hebrew text of Oros HaTeshuvah with a new translation into English, as well as expert commentary in English from Rabbi Moshe Weinberger.

Weinberger draws on his extensive knowledge of Jewish philosophical and inspirational literature to provide profound, moving, and fresh insights into the text, richly explicating the ideas in Oros HaTeshuvah in an accessible and clear but not superficial manner. Readers will come away with a firm grasp on the profound truth at the heart of Kook’s classic work: that teshuvah (repentance) is not a somber process of self-deprivation but a joyful journey back to God and to the core of each individual.

“Song of Teshuvah” covers chapters 14 through 17 of Oros HaTeshuvah and is the fourth and final volume in this simply outstanding series. “Song of Teshuvah” is unreservedly recommended for synagogue, college, and university library Judaic Studies collections in general, and Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook supplemental studies reading lists in particular.

Kaytek the Wizard (written by Janusz Korczak in 1933 and translated into English by Antonia-Lloyd Jones) first premiered as a puppet play in 2016 (BriAnimations Living Entertainment). This production has been performed across the U.S., from Tennessee to Maine to California, at festivals, schools and performing arts centers.

At the August 2018 International Korczak Conference in Seattle, Washington, the production won a recognition award for introducing audiences to this man who is often referred to as “The King of Children”.

]]>https://jewishbookreview.wordpress.com/2018/10/17/kaytek-the-wizard-recognition-award/feed/0Jewish Book MavenKaytek the WizardImage by Erika Chambers www.facebook.com/erikachambersphotographyjkawardA Pioneer of the Jewish publishing Industry – Bernie Scharfstein z”l of Ktavhttps://jewishbookreview.wordpress.com/2018/10/14/a-pioneer-of-the-jewish-publishing-industry-bernie-scharfstein-zl-of-ktav/
https://jewishbookreview.wordpress.com/2018/10/14/a-pioneer-of-the-jewish-publishing-industry-bernie-scharfstein-zl-of-ktav/#respondSun, 14 Oct 2018 09:24:33 +0000http://jewishbookreview.wordpress.com/?p=7686The New York Times

SCHARFSTEIN–Bernard, passed away peacefully at home in the loving embrace of his family on October 4, 2018 at age 92. Bernie devoted his professional life to Jewish scholarship and education. In close collaboration with his late brother, Sol, he published Jewish scholarly books and educational material at KTAV Publishing House, which was founded by his parents, Asher and Fannie in the 1940s. He was recognized for his impact on Jewish scholarship and learning with an honorary doctorate from Yeshiva University in 1997.

Born on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, Bernie attended Yeshiva College, where he starred on the basketball team, which in its day competed against leading college teams. He graduated from New York University and received a law degree from Brooklyn Law School. He was an avid reader of The New York Times, where many of his letters to the editor were published. He is survived by his wife, Barbara, to whom he was devoted for 59 years and their three sons, David (Sarah), Jonathan (Suzanne) and Daniel (Julie). He is also survived by nine loving grandchildren (Allison, Rebecca, Michelle, Benjamin, Julia, Kayla, Eliza, Ava and Nadia). It gave him great joy that all of his children and grandchildren were educated at Jewish day schools, where they learned from many KTAV books, and that they continue to have a deep appreciation for Judaism.

New Beginnings

It is a new year with new reviews for your reading and learning pleasure.

One of our nation’s oldest Jewish publishers, Ktav Publishing, recently brought to the Jewish reading public a fascinating literary work, “Six Days of Cosmology and Evolution: A Scientific Commentary on the Genesis Text With Rabbinic Sources” by Daniel Langer, with an endorsement from astrophysicist Dr. Amitai Bin-Nun.

With the upcoming Torah readings from the book of Genesis this timely work should serve as a unique literary experience tailored to both our religious and intellectual needs.

The method employed by the author utilizes a verse by verse analysis of the Genesis narrative of the story of the world’s creation through the use of both scientific and rabbinic “lenses”.

In his introduction the author details for us his goals in what has in previous generations proven to be a daunting literary experience.

“The aim of this book is to demonstrate that the Torah’s account of Creation is not in conflict with the sciences of cosmology, geology, or evolution. This requires an understanding of the nature of time, the overlapping character of the six days, and the use of homonyms in the Bible.”

Further on the author details the following very candid sentiments:

“This approach will be criticized from the left and from the right. Fundamentalists who hold a literal reading of Scripture may object to the suggestion that words in the Torah can mean different things to different generations, or that passages can be reinterpreted in ways that conform to empirical data and scientific theory. Scholars on the left hold that the Torah is not a science text: treating it as such distorts its message.”

The author concludes his introductory thesis with the following teaching from that great scholar Rabbi Elie Munk, zt”l, from his classical commentary, “The Call of the Torah” where he teaches us the following:

“The Torah does not stipulate as an absolute act of faith that G-d exists. Indeed, the existence of G-d is presupposed throughout, but it is not the object of a proof, nor even of a doubt. But the word order in the initial verse of the Torah [The word “God” appears after “created”] discreetly suggests that we seek out G-d in Creation, and so progressively acquire with our intelligence that which faith puts forward to us at the beginning of our human experience. For faith is crowned by knowledge.”

The timely publication of this work beginning with the reading of Sefer Bereishis makes for a very fortunate religious literary decision.

For someone whose educational career spanned over 50 years, the number of books from Rav Joseph B. Soloveitchik is rather scant. While there are a number of articles from him, the number of books he wrote is few.

Rabbi Jonathan Ziring quotes Rabbi Mosheh Lichtenstein and explained the reason why there are relatively few books from Rav Soloveitchik and from his father Rav Aharon Lichtenstein (Rav Soloveitchik’s son-in-law). He explained that in Europe, there were many great European rabbis who lived in very small towns and the entirety of their creative enterprise was based in writing. They did this as their rabbinic duties didn’t take up much of their time, or demand much of their intellectual energies. But as these figures become roshei yeshiva, their creative enterprise was with their students, and their writings become much less.

Perhaps no one personifies that more than Rav Soloveitchik. While we have his classics The Lonely Man of Faith, Halakhic Man, and a few others, they really don’t add up to more than a few hundred pages. While his page count is low, his legacy is bound up in his students, and their students.

In Scholarly Man of Faith: Studies in the Thought and Writings of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, editors Rabbis Ephraim Kanarfogel and Dov Schwartz have gathered collected essays from six experts in the thought of Rav Soloveitchik. Namely Rabbis Shalom Carmy, David Shatz and Ephraim Kanarfogel, and Drs. Shira Weiss, Daniel Rynhold and Alex Sztuden.

As to the lack of written work by Rav Soloveitchik, Rabbi Shatz notes that this was a common lament during the Rav’s lifetime. While Shatz writes that the lamest of the scarcity of publications by the Rav were exaggerated, the reality is that they are indeed insufficient.

With essays on topics such as Biblical Hermeneutics in the Thought of R. Soloveitchik: A Preliminary Appraisal of the Influence of R. Yehudah Halevi, Science of Hermeneutics? Rav Soloveitchik’s Scientific Method Revisited and more, this is a book by serious scholars and meant for a readership well-versed in western philosophy and at home with Rav Soloveitchik’s worldview. For such readers, Scholarly Man of Faith is a reminder just how timeless and relevant Rav Soloveitchik was, and is.

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